Main Game Concepts
ToI plans to be a complete overhaul of almost every ingame aspect, overwriting from small things like variables to tweak balance, to unique new systems that will simulate our goals better. How these will be implemented, or if they actually will work is a question yet to be answered, and almost everything here is not available yet; this page's purpose is to tidy up ideas so they can be used in future development. Features will be classified by their goal in making an extended game that stretches for 2 centuries. Continuous Game In vanilla HOI4, the end of a war is the absolute end of a conflict, where the victor has complete control over the loser at a price for complete victory. This is due to represent the ideological conflicts and stance of total war, neither side being able to back off during an ideological war. This wouldn't be the case for a war in the 1800s, or in fact a war that isn't caused by fascist governments. The game results in a halt of conflict after a war is won, and after the peace conference there is nothing to do. Similarly, winning a war has a far too hefty price, being perfect for a certain scenario but a certain scenario only, it being WW2. Even if a third threat exists after a global scale war is over, the imbalance of power and lack of content troubles a smooth, balanced and realistic gameplay. VHOI4's goal isn't having a strong nation, making world peace or even dominating the world- it's simply winning one war. To solve the problem of the game coming to a abrupt halt after WW2, we needed to solve the core of this problem, the peace conferences. Additional content to give scenarios after a large scale war is also required, along with assuring the player doesn't break world balance so hard it renders the game "boring". Our general goal is making a game experience like HOI4, heavily immersed into scenarios but a war experience like EU4, giving a continuous, but not tedious experience. Peace Conferences and Peace VHOI4 peace conferences are very imbalanced, along with the concept of peace itself. Making a peace without capitulating all major opponents is impossible, and even that causes a white peace, throwing your hard effort in the trash. (Abandoning your allies during war is also "impossible"- as documented our main goals are changing "impossible" to "considered impossible", giving hefty penalties.) Peace will not only be decided by the diplomacy screen, but through events. When you are winning/losing a war in a certain amount, you will be able to send the opponent a peace treaty- you decide whether you send it or not. These events aren't sent from anyone, they are suggestions by the AI that allow you to send a peace offer. Events you get will generally look like this- Title: Demand Alsace-Lorraine/Renounce control on Alsace-Lorraine Description: We control the region of Alsace-Lorraine, their population support us and the war is going in our favour. The French fear our advance and seem to be tired of war after 10 months, and will certainly give in to our demands if we were to send them. Having / The Germans threat our nation with their continuous victories and charge into our lands. We are devastated, most of our land is in their hands and we don't have enough time or resources to retaliate. It may be only a matter of time before we fall to them. Perhaps offering what they came for would reduce both of our losses, before it's too late. Options: 1. This war is now our stage. Why refuse a low-risk-high-return for a trivial idea like peace? 2. Perhaps our losses may not be much compared to them, but they still have broken our nation and only will grow with time. / 1. Nonsense! We are a part of this war, and will fight for what is ours notwithstanding what we may lose! 2. If a peace offer is sent, a peace offer is received; the content would be the same, but your options would be the opposite. Using this mechanic, wars can halt if a certain goal is accomplished, so you don't have to rely on focus trees to retake your historic provinces. They also give a meaning to wargoals; if the wager of war has a wargoal for taking/retaking a province, the peace will be based on said wargoal. The event localisation would be different, and there would be a higher chance for acceptance. Of course, allowing peace to be settled without complete victories/losses would be meaningless if war wasn't a big trouble. If the opponent was in such a bad state that they would give in to your demands, they would fall anyways when time is given. That's why war will be designed to be much, much more devastating and demanding than vanilla. War Exhaustion In VHOI4, the idea of war exhaustion isn't necessarily well represented. War will be risky, will be easier to make middle defense and peace would sound like a good idea if the damages of war weren't only represented by decreasing manpower numbers and broken factories. War exhaustion won't be a value like in EU4, but will be represented by active events. If a certain amount of people die in your nation, flavour events will trigger and people will revolt against your current war effort. In special occasions, like the Christmas Truce special events will occur causing not only reduction of recruitable population, but could even chain towards a forced peace and no troops at all. War exhaustion is largely divided into 3 categories, burnout, revolts and pressure. Burnout is caused by the usage of resources during the war effort, and includes the investments in the war machine before the war, and recovery after the war. Along with the loss of manpower and destruction of infrastructure/factories, burnout events give a much larger challenge and make war risky. Starvation, diseases, and blackouts will plague your war effort, and when not treated will spread to a war epidemic. Guerrilla warfare comes into a similar category, ruining infrastructure and foundations to the war machine. Revolts are caused by the people desiring peace; this won't happen unless you're losing the war, a large portion of your nation is influenced by pacifism or conscription laws are too harsh. These events will cause divisions to refuse to fight, disbanding them and lowering your manpower, along with increasing pacifism. When untreated, revolts can be used by opponent nations and could grow to a great threat, eventually into a civil war. Pressure isn't an internal cause; neighbouring nations that think you're invading their sphere of influence, too aggressive or disagree with your stance of war can give pressure on both sides for cease fire through events. They could threat for embargoes, support the other side(in the case of an uneven war) or even join the war against you, similarly being a threat. Eras VHOI4 doesn't support a game that constantly changes over the years. All it needs to span is across around 10 to 20 years; unfortunately we can't change that. This is why we have decided to implement the idea of eras; an existent, functional group of time that puts effect on gameplay. Eras are divided like so; Industrial Era(~1860), Civil War Era(1860~1892), WW1 Era(1892~1918), Interwar Era(1918~1933), WWII Era(1933~1945), Post-War Era(1945~1968), Cold War Era(1968~1992), Modern Era(1992~2016), Information Era(2016~). Each Era has its own characteristics, and effect gameplay by increasing research on certain areas, limit available divisions or act as a modifier, allowing or restricting certain events. What each Era does will be specified in the Era page. Point Scenarios Two hundred years is a very long time to play, and unfortunately it's very difficult to span the density of VHOI4 content over all the possible scenarios that can happen during two centuries. Focus trees, events and flags/leaders are what make the game interesting, but if the game goes wild we can't make these flavour elements for every new nation, new scenario and new leader; this is why we set a "point scenario". Point scenarios are practically like Historical Focuses working on the player; the player will be constantly given controlled scenarios and lead them to content that is already completed. The player won't be necessarily reminded about the point scenarios, but the game will constantly create events that attempt to restore the point scenarios. This will be enacted using events that work according to special tags, and complicated intertwined networks; frankly the only way to use new concepts in HOI4. Many point scenarios won't be as densely flavoured as others, but they should be implemented in a way that doesn't restrict the player in any way at all. All decisions should be made by the player. Recruitment Overhaul It's quite an experience for the average computer to last past the 1945 point, where every country seems to field around 100 divisions. Imagine how this would turn out after 200 years. The VHOI4 system shows a "growth" in nation manpower, perhaps not linear, but when left for a century or two nations like Germany or the States could possibly have thousands of divisions and tens of millions of men in the field. This isn't very sensible, and caused by linear laws that reduce civilian factories/increase manpower without any prices. When a certain amount of men are in the field, growth, recruitable men and training speed will reduce; it will induce a maximum amount of people in the field. This number will vary by ideology, but mostly won't excede 5 million. Stability Overhaul VHOI4 doesn't have the best idea of national stability; certainly changing your ideology entirely would cause instability within the government, but national unity doesn't effect your nation so much. Political power is quite similar, it doesn't represent any accurate figure. ToI aims to add two new figures, Stability(National Unity) and Political Control(Political Power). Stability Stability is a figure of how content your people are about the current government, its policies and its laws. It also shows how devoted your people are towards your current goals. Note this is different from party popularity as it also includes factors your government isn't necessarily responsible for, like famine or the social regime. Stability isn't much different from National Unity in the base game as it represents how much people are united; it slightly differs at it also includes the contentment of your people. What differs in ToI is what it effects; higher Stability increases recruitment, ideology drift defense, factory production etc. and decreases civilian factories, partisan effects, capitulation threshold etc. Stability can be controlled mostly through laws and policies, but also is greatly effected by event chains. Generally stability and production efficiency have inverse relations, but this isn't always the case; there are many situations where one-dimensional trade between stability and production efficiency aren't all that matter. Stability is also increased by having high Political Control. Stability can range from 90%~80%(Very High), 79%~ 70%(High), 69%~60%(Content), 59%~50%(Discontent), 49%~40%(Low), and 39%~(Unstable). Each step has its effects that are specified in the Stability page. Low Stability means your people are discontent with your current doings and will revolt against your actions; their goals are rarely aligned with ideologies without outside manipulation. Low Stability effects general production and battle; the physical engine of your war machine. Your nation would capitulate much easier as well as like in VHOI4. On the other hand, high Stability means your people are inspired and eager to follow your commands. This increases combat strength of your soldiers and production efficiency. Political Control Political Control is a value of how much control you have over the general government. High Political Control allows you to execute laws and policies without much problem, and keep your government stable. Unlike Stability, Political Control isn't a status that has to do with your general people, but your cabinet and system of government. Unlike Political Power in VHOI4, Political Control isn't a spendable currency; it's similar to Stability being a term that represents your percentage of control. New cabinet members, laws/policies and generals aren't introduced by expending Political Power, but can be appointed when Political Control is higher than a certain value. Only in certain situations, like employing a fascist cabinet in a democracy or increasing recruitment will expend small amounts of political control. Political control is gained by having the right collection of cabinet members, making the right decisions in policies and events, having high stability and having high party popularity. Low Political Control isn't a direct hazard, and doesn't immediately effect your nation. But in the long run, your nation will be much easily politically divided, and without being capable to control your nation event chains are most likely to run haywire. Certain decisions in events are blocked with low Political Control, and very low Political Control can even cause civil wars. Political Control and Stability have overlapping areas, both representing how well your nation is being maintained. Keeping them at sound values are crucial for having a successful game, nonetheless dominating the world. Alongside the vanilla causes for instability, ToI plans on adding new causes for instability through events. This also gives a challenge for the player aiming for world conquest, enforcing the idea of "easy to learn, hard to master", Independence Revolts Owning a large amount of uncored territory shouldn't accept your rule as soon as the war is over. Owning uncored states that releasable nations can control cause instability.Category:Meta Category:Pre-Dev Category:Game Mechanics